Mechanical Engineering Glossary

The item Glossary – what is it?

The item Glossary is a glossary of terminology used in the mechanical engineering sector and a technical dictionary in one. It is designed to support students who work with specialist texts in German and English and is available free of charge as both a web application and an app.

The item Glossary currently comprises a bilingual technical dictionary (DE>EN, EN>DE) with approximately 26,000 entries. It contains key terms that students can expect to encounter when studying general mechanical engineering and the fundamentals of electrical engineering and mathematics. Also included is material from the "Taschenwörterbuch Maschinenbau & Elektrotechnik Deutsch – Englisch" by Günter Glass, which is published by the Hueber Verlag in Ismaning, Germany.

The glossary, which is also bilingual, defines key terms in an explanatory text, sometimes with an accompanying picture or diagram. Glossary entries indicate related terminology, too.

New entries are being added all the time. To date, there are entries on the following subject areas: "Electrical engineering", "ergonomics", "production processes", "conveying technology", "design technology", "mechanical engineering" "mechatronics", "metrology and sensor technology" and "control technology". Work is still ongoing to significantly expand the number of keywords in these specialist areas. Additional areas such as "material strength", "machine dynamics", "mathematics", "material science" and "lean management / lean production" are being prepared.

Professor Heinrich Kern from Ilmenau University of Technology is the specialist overseeing the content of the glossary entries.

The item Glossary – how does it work?

The item Glossary is accessed via the multilingual dictionary (currently DE>EN and EN>DE). You can enter any term in the search field and the system will immediately search for matching content.

Your search results will include all the relevant entries that are listed in the item Glossary. Keywords in the dictionary marked with a "G" have a corresponding glossary entry.